Reykjavik!

I can't write much, because it's already midnight here, which means I have to wake up in 4 hours (again). BUT! I went to the blue lagoon today, the hot springs, it was FAN. TASTIC. I loved it. I could have stayed in much much longer than the 2+ hours we were in there, except that it made my hair exceedingly difficult to brush afterwards. Natalie was sick, so just Brekke and I went, until Natalie showed up right as we had changed and were about to leave! We hung out on a dock with her though for a while so she could go in, and then we ate and let her have more time. Let me tell you, except for my icky hair texture (i coudn't even get a barrette in after I showered at the hotel and brushed it) I feel great. It made my skin really soft, and the pumace/sandy floor exfoliates your feet, and they have boxes scattered about where you can scoop up silica/moisturizer mud mask that you leave on 5-10 minutes and then just wash off in the water. It's so excellent!! (too bad it's REALLY expensive in the gift shop.) The water, brekke said, is used to power 90% of the country, and then filtered and sent into the pool and mixed with ocean water, so it's really clean and really white! You can't even see 5" deep. The sand on the floor was actually mostly black, or b&w in some parts, but the water's so blue-white that we couldn't convince our brains it wasn't white sand on the bottom. It was great, and exhausting, and I think I got a wee little bit of a sunburn. My only gripe is that I stepped into a deep hole while we were walking, and my camera got splashed and stopped working so i never got my picture of me in the steamy rock pools that I wanted!!! RRR :'(

After we got back, the 3 of us walked around Reykjavik for a while (like, 4 pm -10 pm) and I am TIRED. There's a hill to the main street we're on, and I must have walked at LEAST 10 miles today. The only time we weren't walking was when we had coffee (BEST. COFFEE. EVER.) and then later when we had dinner at a vegetarian restaurant Brekke found (go figure). I didn't buy too much, until we stopped at the 24 hour grocery store during broad daylight at around 10:00 pm to get yogurt for breakfast tomorrow (they have SO MUCH icelandic yogurt! I love it!!).

And then I found the chocolate aisle.

I ended up choosing 2 bars of the same brand of my favorite chocolate from home (which is icelandic) without realizing it, and then I found the icelandic version of that, and all was lost and I ended up with essentially 4 bars of chocolate. It cost me I think 1026 icelandic kroner, or about 8 or 9 dollars. Good deal!! I love that the currency exchange is such that I spend in the thousands and it cost me only in the single dollars. And it helps that everything is comparatively cheap, too.

I took sooo many pictures of the city today (with my nice camera) and I'm going to post some from yesterday and today when I get to Copenhagen sometime. Speaking of which, I have to get up in approximately 4 hours from now to catch the flybus back to Keflavik airport, so I better get to bed now. I really hope we have as little luggage & turbulence issues as we did on the way here, but the flight's only 3 hours to copenhagen so we should be okay. I'll write more tomorrow once I'm at the apartment in Copenhagen!! Goodnight!

p.s. it looks like it's about 7:00 outside, judging from the light, and it's after midnight here. This country is wack, it's like a different planet. And I love it!!

I made it!!

Leg one of my journey: complete! I'm in the hotel (Room with a View) in Reyjkavik now, and I just got the wifi to work. This hotel is soo nice, and it's not even one of the pricier ones! It's only about 150 a night, and it's got a HUGE bathroom, a great looking kitching with microwave, fridge, etc., a giant flatscreen tv, red leather couch, and everything's all brand new looking, with glass and metal table tops and fixtures, tile and wood floors, etc. I'll post with pictures later, when I've unpacked all my stuff in Copenhagen maybe.

The bus ride was amazing. Not in any particular way, just that it was so light out (it looked like 4 am light, or like manhattan at night). That was the first thing I noticed. Cody's first comment was "welcome to maine!" and that really is what it looked like. On the plane when we were nearing Iceland, the sun in the plane looked like it was maybe 6 or 7 pm, not 11:45! The whole thing felt like a dream, I went through security (they check AGAIN when you get off, make you stand in line, take your shoes off, that whole thing) and then made my way out of the airport and onto the bus. When we left keflavik we drove on the highway (i guess, it was only like 40 or 50 mph) and the clouds lightened a little. I gotta tell ya, this landscape is amazing. I was just so fascinated staring out the window, everyone kept turning left and right so as not to miss a single image. The busses have nice huge windows, so you can take everything in. The land was pretty flat, but rocky and volcanic-y looking, with moss over everything. It's just so different from anywhere I've seen! It reminded me of when we drove into Moab, Utah, and you just want to soak every single sight in and notice every detail, and everything is just so foreign you don't even have time to stop and think how far from home you are. It also kind of felt a little bit like driving up to Canada this winter, the trees in Reykjavik look a little similar, and it's got this foreign-old world-modern vibe and everything is just so cute and quaint. I love it!

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Rewind!

My flight was good, there was a minor issue when Cody's seat was not where it was supposed to be, but we waited till the new passengers (there were transfer passengers coming also) were seated and then they switched him back to next to me. The flight was good, my nerves settled down once we got in the air. There was very little turbulence, which is almost unusual (but very lucky!) according to the lady next to us, who said the wind around iceland makes it very rough sometimes, so all the pilots are really good pilots because they have to deal with crazy wind most of the time. Cody and I first watched the movie they were playing, some sappy movie about this nyc boy who has a giant crush on this girl, and the whole thing is like him second guessing what to say to her. Then watched my new pushing daisies dvds, and the lady (same lady) next to him (I was at the window) points at the screen and was like, oh, that actress? Kristin Chenoweth? I went to high school with her, we like grew up together. NO. EFFING. WAY. but it's totally true! They weren't like best friends, but they were both drama kids at Broken Arrow High School, and she's known her since middle school. Cody and I ended up switching seats when I got up to use the bathroom, and this woman (who was extremely nice) and I (and cody somewhat, amidst his snickering) got to talking about Kristin and looking at the old pictures in her book (which of course I have) for maybe a solid half hour? at least. I'm sure cody will tell you it felt like an hour and a half. She had lots of little cute memories about what "Kristi" was like, and we both shared our joy at finding fellow Cheno fans. Cody just laughed at me the whole time. It was like in Cat's Cradle, when he talks about the people you meet who are part of your "group" and you just know, well I had a feeling something interesting would happen with someone I met on this flight, and I was right! Ohh, Kristin, I just love you! I know I'll never hear the end of this from Cody (who already made fun of how nervous I was during takeoff), he got a full glimpse of how much I am a fan of hers and how much I know (and will talk about) her to someone who shares my interest.

Now, it's already close to 3 am here, so I have to go to bed! Natalie gets in in only about 3 or 4 hours, and then we have a bus at 9:30 to the blue lagoon (!!!). I'll post more tomorrow, I am taking lots of pictures and I'll post them soon, like I said probably from Copenhagen.

TWO DAYS!!

I can't belieeeeve it! I really cannot. Two days from now I will be at Logan airport, and two days and 2 hours from this very moment I will be boarding the plane to Iceland. AAHHH!!!! I just called Iceland Air to see if they could seat me and cody together, because we're on the same flight (he called and said they said no, I didn't trust that he tried hard enough) and it's a good thing i called, because now Nina from Iceland Air customer service is my new best friend. She moved me up 4 rows and kept my window seat, and now im next to cody! yaaay! and she changed the flight home too so i never have to fly alone!! (Natalie and I are flying together to and from copenhagen-iceland together) I love Nina. And now I have a person to call, MOM, if something goes wrong with my booking. Which it won't, because this isn't the 70's, but still. Now I have a name to drop, feel better?

I have my list of every item I have to pack, and the measurements of my giant pink suitcase are juuust under the limit, i just hope it weighs under 50 lbs.

EEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The next time I post will be from Iceland!!! IN TWO DAYS!!! AHHH!!!!

Departure in T- 5.... 4....

FOUR DAYS till I leave, folks!! It still doesn't feel like it's really happening, mostly because I know the images I have in my head will be nothing like what it actually looks like. Details like being on the plane, the taxi ride to the hotel in Reykjavik, things like that make it unreal in my mind. I do have waves of realization where i remember that I'm going to EUROPE for the summer. In four days!! Seven weeks is not really that long, it's only half a Pratt semester, time-wise, but it is pretty much all of summer vacation. Especially since it's rained every day here, non-stop, for ohhh about 3.9 years now. I haven't seen the sun in weeks.

In other news, I went to Ikea today with the parentals, came back with very cute (and nice looking!) furnitures for my apartment back in new york. I'm very excited to move in, with Heather, and it'll make going back to school less depressing. So will the notion that come second semester, I'll only have class once, maybe twice a week. That means getting a REAL job, so I don't actually know that that's less depressing, but having fewer classes is definitely exciting!

So, in wrapping up the last few odds and ends here (and waiting for the DVDs I order to hopefully arrive in time for me to have them on the plane ride!!) I'm starting to actually believe that I'm going. To EUROPE. I believe it, I just don't feel it.

P.S. I'm actually forcing myself to work on getting my website up & running enough so that people can actually see a working layout, even if it does need a LOT of additions (like gallerys of my work, for example) but at least it's not a blank page. It'll be functional enough by the end of you tonight that I can direct all of your attention to http://allegra-design.us! Hooray!